Twice a year, during the spring and fall, TV viewers may experience some degree of interference on some channels due to a phenomenon known as “sun outages.” The following information will help you understand what they are and how they could affect you.

What is a sun outage?
A sun outage is an interruption in TV signals caused by interference from solar radiation. The interference is caused when the sun is in direct line with a communication signal and the sun’s radiation overwhelms it.

How does this affect watching TV?
During this time, you may experience interference on some channels that can affect picture quality and sound when watching television. The picture, for instance, may pixilate slightly, or clicking sounds may be heard. In some cases, picture or sound may completely drop for a few minutes. Sun outages do not affect Internet or phone service.

How long does the interference last?
Such interference can last up to several minutes a day.

When will this interference occur?
This fall, sun outages may affect some channels – though only intermittently and generally only for a few minutes at a time – between October 4 and October 17. The effects, if visible, will occur during daylight hours.

What should you do?
If you experience picture or sound interference during these times, please be patient. Your service should return to normal after a short while.

This week we activated two exciting services through our WatchTVEverywhere product. WatchESPN will allow you to get live sports events and programs from any ESPN Network you are subscribed to on your cable account. This now includes SEC Network! Watch your games while on the road and away from home.

Also today, August 28, Starz Play became available for any of our Starz/Encore subscribers.

For this you will need to activate your WatchTVEverywhere account. To find out how, visit www.ccc-cable.com/tvehelp and follow the instructions.

Both services will work with their respective Apps from the Apple store for iPhones, iPads and iPods, or Google Play for your Android devices.

If you need further help, feel free to give us a call at 1-800-272-2191 or email us at support@ccc-cable.net

CCC Cable announced today two new changes that have been made to better serve Basic Cable subscribers in Drew and Bradley counties:

1: KARK-4, the NBC station from Little Rock, will replace KTVE10 from Monroe. It will continue on KTVE’s former channel location, 10 in Basic and 210 or 10-1 in High Definition. CCC subscribers have been requesting KARK for many years, however signal interference from of a station in Mississippi has made it impossible to receive KARK over the air at the Monticello, AR headend facility.

2: Major mprovements to broadcast station signal have been made.
Today, CCC cable announced a partnership with The Media Gateway of Little Rock, to receive the The “Big 4” broadcast stations, KATV-ABC, KTHV-CBS, KARK-NBC and KLRT-FOX, through a fiber optic connection. This eliminates the interference issues affect the over the air digital broadcast stations and brings a much more reliable product to cable customers and will continue to operate during thunderstorms.

Since 1972, broadcast stations have been primarily received to cable headends over the air using towers and commercial receivers. CCC Cable has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years erecting a 350’ tower and upgrading antennas to receive the best possible signal from the Little Rock TV stations. Even still, because of the 120 mile distance, the analog broadcast stations were subject to interference by other distant stations, atmospheric conditions, and electrical interference. In 2009, the FCC mandated all broadcast stations ceased analog broadcast, and begin broadcasting in digital. When this happened, KARK of Little Rock and WABG of Greenville, MS were both assigned the same UHF channel to broadcast on, causing KARK4 to go dark for much of Southeast Arkansas.

Even with the better picture that came with digital, the same interference issues that plagued analog broadcast were worsened in the digital format, resulting in channels being unviewable when affected. CCC Cable, in an effort to make broadcast more reliable entered an agreement with Echostar to bring broadcast stations through their commercial satellite services. Unfortunately, as those who subscribe to satellite services such as DirecTV and Dish network regularly experience, satellite technology is affected by rain fade and heavy clouds.

CCC Cable is proud to be a local provider of Cable TV, Internet and telephone service for residential and business customers. CCC’s Customer Service can be reached at 800-272-2191 should you have any questions regarding these changes. An updated lineup can be viewed at www.ccc-cable.net.